1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to video chat telecommunications, and more particularly to a video chat system enabling a provider to facilitate a video chat between disparate video chat devices.
2. Background of Related Art
Conventional telehealth programs such as Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) promise a way to improve health care in America by transforming how primary care is organized and delivered, but are dependent upon communications between a patient and their provider. Under PCMH, primary care physicians have a regular and ongoing chat with their chronically ill or otherwise demanding patients just from a care standpoint. Physicians can keep in touch with their patients, e.g., every couple of weeks, with a scheduled telephone call making sure that their patients are taking their medications, making sure that their patients are following up with wound care, with the overall intent to avoid hospital readmissions.
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) defines a medical home not simply as a place but as a model of the organization of primary care that delivers the core functions of primary health care.
The primary care medical home is accountable for meeting the large majority of each patient's physical and mental health care needs, including prevention and wellness, acute care, and chronic care. Providing comprehensive care requires a team of care providers. This team might include physicians, advanced practice nurses, physician assistants, nurses, pharmacists, nutritionists, social workers, educators, and care coordinators. Although some medical home practices may bring together large and diverse teams of care providers to meet the needs of their patients, many others, including smaller practices, may build virtual teams linking themselves and their patients to providers and services in their communities.
The primary care medical home provides health care that is relationship-based with an orientation toward the whole person. Partnering with patients and their families requires understanding and respecting each patient's unique needs, culture, values, and preferences. The medical home practice actively supports patients in learning to manage and organize their own care at the level the patient chooses. Recognizing that patients and families are core members of the care team, medical home practices ensure that they are fully informed partners in establishing care plans.
The primary care medical home coordinates care across all elements of the broader health care system, including specialty care, hospitals, home health care, and community services. Such coordination is particularly critical during transitions between sites of care, such as when patients are being discharged from the hospital. Medical home practices also excel at building clear and open communication among patients and families, the medical home, and members of the broader care team.
An attempt to launch PCMH was made with Microsoft Link™ (now called SKYPE FOR BUSINESS™). The present inventor appreciated that this attempt ran into difficulties with usability, was too difficult for the end users (patients) to get the SKYPE FOR BUSINESS™ program installed, and required an inordinate amount of time on technical troubleshooting.
Recent research has shown that 75 million ‘virtual’ doctor visits, or 1 in 6, will occur now in a given year. It has been forecast that the video telemedicine market in North America alone will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 16.7 percent from 2012 to reach an estimated more than $600M in 2017. It has been said that this growth will intensify as telehealth initiatives align with the goals of the Federal government and Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) to reduce healthcare spending and improve the quality of patient care.
Currently, the present inventor has realized that a major barrier to mass adoption of telehealth is the complexity of current proprietary application-based solutions. Conventional telehealth methods and systems require custom user applications to be installed at both the doctor's user device as well as each patient's user device.
There is a need for a better communication system to facilitate an effective and efficient telehealth solution.